How To Fix “Checking Battery State” Error

We recently ran into a “checking battery state” error on a Zorin Linux v7 installation where the system just hung for a long time at the “checking battery state” stage when starting up. Zorin Linux is a very easy to use operating system, especially for those making the transition from a Windows environment. As it turned out, this wierd error was quite easy to rectify.

After installing Zorin version 7 core, we proceeded to run “sudo apt-get update” and installed a ton of updated packages and that’s when the problem started.

During the boot up sequence, the system would get stuck at the “Checking battery state” stage and would hang there for a long time. Several installations in a Virtualbox environment produced the same results leading us to conclude that something in the update packages was breaking X11, the Graphical User Interface.

In Zoring Linux, it looks like the Window Manager is the Light Display Manager (LightDM) and for some reason, during the update process, a file called “lightdm-gtk-greeter” is downloaded but never installed.

When the system boots up after the update, the “greeter” is not available to load the login screen. If you use the Ctrl + Alt + F1 combination, you will be presented with a command line login screen where you can login and use “Startx” to bring up the GUI. But that is a tedious process.

To fix the problem, use the Ctrl + Alt + F1 option to login and proceed to install the missing greeter by running:

#sudo apt-get install lightdm-gtk-greeter

If you watch the process closely, you will notice that the package installer says something like “configuring previously ignored…”. Once the gtk-greeter file is installed, reboot the system and you should be presented with the normal graphical login screen.

This worked for us, but as usual, your experience may vary. Good luck.